Jazzville Skyline: “…being frank…”

I have always been an advocate of documentaries being around one hour in length, but a new documentary, that could very well be one of the best of the year, has a running time of almost three hours (and that’s not even including the bonus material).

The documentary…”From Straight To Bizarre”, is the story of the two record labels that Frank Zappa developed, ‘Straight’ and ‘Bizarre’, as a means of not having to deal with the ‘studio system’.

…and during the 60’s, EVERYONE was against the system…

But Frank also liked having the labels as a way of discovering acts that, generally, wouldn’t be discovered, and giving them an outlet for those who may be interested, in any.

Of course, Frank And The Mothers recorded their albums for the labels, but, along the way, he also picked up such luminaries as Wild Man Fisher and The GTO’s, who weren’t exactly that memorable to the music world.

However, the labels also featured such ‘name-dropping’ artists as comedians Lenny Bruce and Lord Buckley, as well as two musical standouts, Captain Beefheart and Alice Cooper, who both got exceptional public notice from their particular output that continues to this day.

And this documentary captures it all from start to finish, traversing all the terrain, the good, bad, and indifferent, with interviews from many of the artists themselves, both in ‘filmed’ bits from the time, as well as current ‘present day’ remembrances, allowing us to glimpse a perfect ‘snapshot’ of a time gone by.